


Haunted Houses

by Port



Category: Sleepy Hollow (TV)
Genre: Gen, Post-1.09 Sanctuary
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-20
Updated: 2015-12-20
Packaged: 2018-05-07 22:11:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,196
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5472446
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Port/pseuds/Port
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"I am saying haunted houses do not work for me. Not as a child, not now, not ever."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Haunted Houses

**Author's Note:**

  * For [dkwilliams](https://archiveofourown.org/users/dkwilliams/gifts).



“What did he look like, Lieutenant?”

Abby turned her glass around on the table, watching the rum at the bottom swirl clockwise. She’d been expecting Crane to ask questions once they had made some headway into the bottle, but this one surprised her.

She shrugged. “Like a baby?”

Ichabod smiled ruefully. “Yes, I suppose I should not have asked such a vague question. Did he appear healthy?”

They were seated in the closed-off library, surrounded by shelves and walls full of Americana and occult knowledge. Abby still hoped to convince Crane to join her and Jenny for a late Thanksgiving dinner, but if that didn’t happen, this in itself--sitting together in the golden lamplight under a mural of Washington leading his troops--would do as well for a holiday memory. Somewhat melancholy, given the events of the day--the plant-creature’s attack at the old house, Abby’s unexpected visions. But sometimes you took what you could get.

She softened. “I’m sorry, Crane. Yeah, I didn’t get a great look, but he was crying as soon as he came out, and he seemed the normal size for a newborn. He had a wrinkly, red face and a little hair, and Katrina couldn’t seem to decide whether to laugh or cry. When they told her it was a boy, she looked so proud.”

Crane was staring into the wood-grain of the table, a delicate smile at his mouth. 

“It’s so unfair that I was the one with the vision,” Abby suddenly said, surprising herself with how strongly she felt this. “You should have been the one to see all that.”

Crane nodded sadly. “I suspect you were privy to the vision because of your familial connection with the matron of the house, Grace Dixon.” He shook his head. “I cannot begrudge you that.”

Abby sipped some more to keep from pressing the point. Crane was certainly aware of the injustice, and nothing could be done anyway. When she glanced back up, Crane shot her a crooked smile, as though he knew exactly what she was thinking. He lifted the bottle of rum and poured some more for them both.

“Tell me about haunted houses,” Crane said into the comfortable silence that followed. “You indicated some familiarity and dislike for them, if I remember correctly.”

“And after what we went through in there, I always will.” She shuddered. “It’s a horror movie genre. Poltergeist, The Shining. Always scared the shit out of me.”

“Haunted houses do not work for you. I took note of your words: ‘Not as a child, not now, not ever.’” He left the obvious question hanging.

“You and your photographic memory.”

“You deflect. Something tells me that was not your first haunted house.”

Abby gave him her most nonplussed look.

“Are you looking to hear a personal ghost story?”

“Do you have one?”

He looked truly intrigued.

“Not exactly,” she admitted. “More like, another sad episode from my childhood. Aren’t you tired of hearing those?”

“Honored, actually, to be entrusted with their telling. But I understand if you prefer not to speak of it.” Crane made a show of dampering his curiosity, looking down toward his shoes.

Abby fiddled with her glass and thought about going home to Jenny and having an awkward dinner of burnt turkey and gluten-free pumpkin pie. They really needed to get back to good, but it wasn’t something either of them could force, and to be honest, Abby didn’t feel up to trying tonight.

“All right. It’s to do with my mother, of course. I told you she believed that demons were everywhere, out to get us and all that.”

“You did,” Crane said, solemn.

“Well, she wasn’t too careful who she told, or who was nearby to overhear. The kids on my street took her at her word, started saying our house was haunted. Mama didn’t help matters, up at all hours, looking like a ghost from all her fear and insomnia. For a while, until I knew better, I thought they were right, that our house was haunted. When I got older, I knew it wasn’t true… until I saw Moloch in the woods, and I thought… maybe. We were in foster care at that time, though, living in another house. So much was going on, I didn’t give it a lot of thought.”

Crane was silent for a time, contemplating what she had told him. She could stop there, and it would be enough of the truth. Possibly he could begin to understand, if not really get it. But he was her partner in this, seven years of travails, and she was here with him instead of with Jenny, the only other person who would ever get what it had meant.

“One time when I was seven or eight, real young,” she found herself saying, “there was this boy who lived on the corner house of our street. He had red hair and all these dark freckles. He dared some of his other friends to sneak inside our basement through the cellar door. I didn’t know that until much later. All I knew was there were these sounds coming from the cellar, like someone was down there. I told Mama, and she got real scared. She was the only one hearing things up till then, you see. She took it as… as a bad sign that I was hearing the demons too. Must have thought they were coming for me and Jenny right then, because she dragged us upstairs and locked us all in her bedroom, made us help her barricade the door and prop her mattress against the window. She had a bathroom and sink in there, which was good, since we stayed put for three days.”

Abby suddenly missed Jenny. She took a deep swallow of her rum.

“I think she only let us out because we were so hungry. Mama said to go straight for the front door, and I was sure the demons would snatch us as soon as we came running down the stairs. When they didn’t, when there was nothing there, I asked if we could stop in the kitchen. For a second, I thought she was going to hit me, but then…. I never saw anyone look so torn. She was hungry too.”

Crane’s eyes would be compassionate and steady if she looked up from her glass, no need to confirm it.

“It’s funny. The whole time we were up in that room, I wanted someone strong and brave to come lead us out. A firefighter or my kindergarten teacher. Then today, there’s Grace Dixon, when I really needed her.”

Crane said, “Helping those in need at their most desperate moments seems to be in her nature, even in death. Abby… your strength and bravery, your entire acquittal of yourself today in the face of not only danger but painful memories--”

“Crane--”

“No, no, Lieutenant. I merely wish to say… thank you. You and Grace saved us all.”

“Well, you did kill the creature.”

“Would that I could take an axe to more than that.” He quirked a half-smile her way and she returned it before raising her glass.

 

End.


End file.
